by Mike Stangle
Dave (with a danglin’ butt, sick move), Mike (posing hard, flexin’ thigh like a boss), and Sean.
But not in Vegas. I didn’t even come close. It’s not even an option there. There is just way too much money, security, and beautiful hookers out there to even begin to fuck around with fake IDs. They have a hard enough time controlling the of-age folks; they have no time for underagers like me and Nick Papageorgio. The trip seemed like a wild time for everyone else, but it was downright boring for me. I spent a week (who goes to Vegas for a week anyway!?) riding a fucking roller coaster outside of our hotel, New York–New York, because that was pretty much the only thing I was allowed to do. On top of that, our hotel room faced the loudest part of the roller coaster. Fuck that roller coaster. Do you know how much I hate roller coasters in general? I genuinely hate them. Try folding my entire lanky body into a tiny metal box seat. Make sure my hips are pinned between either side real tight, because I have large (some would even say childbearing) hips. Then when my knees are jammed right against the metal box in front of me, violently jerk me around a track until you’re absolutely sure my week is ruined. Awesome.
When I wasn’t actively hating that roller coaster in New York–New York, I kept busy watching Dave, Denny, Sean, and the gang tear it up night after night. Meanwhile, I was limited to acting like Spaulding in Caddyshack, finishing everyone’s wine. I didn’t even ask Dave or Sean what went on at night after I went to bed; I was just too incredibly jealous. One of the days they were trying to “take it easy,” Dave suggested we go for a walk down the Strip to scope some babes. He bought us both Long Island iced teas (when was the last time you had one of them!?). They were thirty dollars each. I drank one thirty-dollar cocktail that came in a whalebone (a.k.a. party yard). That was the extent of my partying in Las Vegas. I took all of that jealous rage and did what every normal healthy teenager should do with their emotions: bury them deep down inside so they could burst out at the seams years later.
Oh, hello, years later. Before my twenty-first birthday even arrived, I made sure I was going to Vegas. I was born in late October, and I was already planning it in August—the year before. It was like my ego and my liver were teaming up to take revenge on that town for how much I’d been stiffed four years prior. They were like Martin Lawrence and Luke Wilson in Blue Streak, hilariously scheming up a cockamamie plan that was just headed for trouble. Las Vegas is the perfect way to bring in adulthood, because it is filled with adults acting like children. I was so pent-up, I wanted to go beyond that. I wanted to go 4-D. This trip was just the boyz—Dave, myself, and Sean. Also, my birthday is basically right before Halloween. Having your birthday near a holiday is great, because your birthday will always be celebrated even when no one likes you. Our oldest brother, Sean? He was born on Christmas Day. His birthday is on Christmas every year, and every year he gets double gifts, double booze, and everyone is always partying. If he was born in the middle of August, no one would even know he was born.
Throughout the years, I had gotten my birthday/Halloween combinaish just right. Skimpy lady costumes, everybody acts silly, then maybe I get a BJ from a treasure troll in a bar bathroom because it’s a special occasion (I woke up and my hands, face, and peener were all dyed red from her treasure troll hair coloring). But Halloween in Las Vegas was a completely different story. First off, no one in Vegas gave a shit that it was my birthday. More importantly, have you seen the gals in Vegas? Okay, now, have you seen the gals in Vegas on Halloween?! It’s so unbelievable that it’s confusing. Las Vegas represents how good-looking the women of Earth have become and just how fucked all of us men are because of it. How did we get here? Has the cosmetic industry come so far with their face creams and moisturizers that women can just constantly shine on with the heat of a thousand suns? Had the fashion industry done a case study on hundreds of sickos like me, somehow gotten into the deepest parts about what makes us tick, and then exploited that with every dress/skirt/tank top a man would ever want to see? At all the right angles?! I find that I am completely powerless around these women.
This was exactly what has been going on with gals since the dawn of time. Every century they get hotter and hotter than the last. Every generation they lose a terrible trait of yesteryear (bras in the 1960s? Brutal!) and pick up a cooler, sexier one. Where does the train stop? It was a trend that was all culminating right then, at that moment, as I became a legal adult in Vegas. Women in Vegas? They’re the next stage of evolution. The mutants of sexiness. Women train all year for that bachelorette weekend in Vegas. Add the most promiscuous major holiday to that equation? We were in over our heads.
In the weeks leading up to the big weekend, we Stangles got to talking. Plans were brewing. Diets had begun. Bets were wagered. Promises were made. Lies were told. Inventory was taken. We needed to go big. We wanted to come up with an original, funny, cheeky, never-done-before costume concept that we could apply to a group. THINK, you guys. THINK HARD. Then procrastinate until it’s too late. That’s exactly what we did. We got lazy and it didn’t happen, so we just went with Tom Cruise’s Risky Business. High socks, a dress shirt, stupid sunglasses. It’s perhaps the most overdone costume in the history of mailing it in. The only thing setting us apart is that three of us were involved. That makes six giant milky-white legs spilling out of tighty whiteys for all of the Las Vegas Strip to deal with. We were pretty much ready to be arrested.
Our first night in Las Vegas had a calm-before-the-storm type of feeling to it. As we got into our costumes the next day, our enthusiasm was next to impossible to contain. We started drinking and scheming much too early. To start—when you buy a pack of Hanes tighty whiteys they come with five pairs. Sean and Dave got to the pack first and got two pairs each and were able to double up while I was left with just one. It was such an advantage, having two pairs of underoos on. First off—I don’t know the last time you guys have tried on a pair of tighty whiteys, but they’re pretty much see-through. Two pairs fixed that problem. Two pairs also hid any sort of stains or sweat marks that would come from the messy adventure we all knew was ahead. Realizing that advantage, Dave started to call his underwear his “fudgies” and I don’t think he’s referred to any sort of under garments, male or female, as anything but “fudgies” since. Second, when you aren’t wearing pants, you’ve got no pockets! Unless you’re wearing two pairs of fudgies. In that case, you have an extra fudgie layer in which to tuck away your cell phone, wallet, and some socks to enhance your bulge. With one pair, all this stuff is right up against your private parts. It’s just not ideal.
Sean and Dave were walking around fully strapped, fully charged, and with bulges that were tough not to stare at. Their fudgies were stocked. I had to tuck my cell phone and wallet into my high socks because my fudgies were truly running the risk of becoming fudgy. I felt like I was wearing tissue paper, and I couldn’t risk damaging my phone. This would come in to play later in the story. If you think it has anything to do with me not having a wallet, cell phone, or any idea where the fuck I am, you’re absolutely right.
The funny part about having a local Stangle in Las Vegas is we never actually stay on the Strip. We stay at Sean’s house off the strip. It provides so much more room for pregame activities than a hotel room would. Anytime you travel somewhere and you’re in a hotel, you go out so much earlier and soberer than you otherwise would, because you don’t want to be cooped up in a little hotel room with an expensive minibar glaring at you. When you’ve got your older brother’s terribly decorated raised ranch to party in? Entirely different story. What Sean’s house lacked in décor it made up for with a very impressive bar of artisan tequilas. Sean is a big-, big-time liquor snob. I mean that in the best and worst ways possible. He can tell you everything you’d never want to know about every kind of liquor. Sure, Sean’s furniture was second-rate, his bedding was from Old Navy, and the clothes in his closet belonged on the set of Melrose Place. His bar, though? Top-notch. He had spent years researching, hunting down, and colle
cting rare craft tequilas from around the world. Each bottle was unique and beautiful. It felt like Dave and I were looking into Jay Leno’s garage, but instead of classic cars, it was booze.
It was clear he took a lot of pride in his collection, so it was alarming how remorseless Dave and I were when we dug right into it the second he left the house. We were opening four-hundred-dollar bottles of tequila like they were RC Colas, pouring it down each other’s throats and chests while Akon (it was 2009!) was blasting in the background. A few of Sean’s buddies were at the house with us and could not believe what we were doing. Sean seems sort of tough when you don’t know him like we do, so I’m guessing no one ever thought to mess with his extravagant liquor collection. When they saw us dive in, those guys went headfirst after us. It was a nice time.
Sean had been out at Target for an hour, getting us our high socks and white fudgies for the night. When he arrived home to discover what we’d done, he was none too pleased. He had that look on his face the dad from A Christmas Story has after all those dogs eat his turkey dinner. In the hour he was gone, Dave and I drank over $1,600 worth of tequila. More accurately, we drank about $1,100 and dumped the remaining $500 all over each other. How else were we supposed to feel as sexy as we needed to before we went out? Our first stop of the night was Mandalay Bay. Mandalay is my favorite casino in that entire town. Have you ever seen it? It looks like a solid gold mirror. When you get close to one of the mirrored walls and look at yourself in it, you see what you’d look like if you were made of gold. So you essentially see the perfect you. Sean actually worked there at the time—at a tequila bar (making more sense now?) called the Border Grill. That place is off the hook. It’s the best Mexican restaurant you’ve ever eaten at and they also shove liquor down your throat anytime you aren’t inhaling, exhaling, or chewing on some of their world-class ceviche. The Border Grill was a great home base to start at, because it was all people we knew. Good thing, too.
One thing we didn’t consider about not wearing pants or shoes in a Las Vegas casino is that Las Vegas casinos require their patrons to wear both pants and shoes. Sean’s boss at Border Grill told us we were in for a tough night. He stepped up the “early shots” for us because he thought we’d have a hard time getting served elsewhere. How tough could it actually be, though? Sure, we were walking around in fudgies and high socks, and sure, we looked disgusting, but it was Halloween! Surely everyone would be dressed outrageously. Nope. It was a problem literally everywhere we went. Mandalay Bay happens to be on the far west side of the Strip, all the way at the end. As we made our way east from casino to casino, party to party, we were chased out of each new place. Everyone around us was dressed up for Halloween, but we were the ones getting the boot without exception. At least the Luxor had the decency to give us road sodas and let us take the inter-casino tunnels that connect them all. They are lined with the slipperiest carpet you’ve ever seen in your life—but only if you’re just wearing socks. On top of that, Sean had this genius idea when we were getting our costumes ready to tape the bottom of our socks with this white chrome metallic tape his local hardware store yokel told him would give us some extra mileage. No one has ever been more right about anything, ever. The combination of the casino carpet with tight, high socks wrapped in metallic tape was like straight ice. We were sliding around that thing like a bunch of maniacs. It was perfect! Tom Cruise’s sock slide had never been done so well.
When we were getting escorted out of Excalibur, they had seen what a grand entrance we had made on the ice-carpet and decided to take us out the door instead. That really stunk, because we had just perfected how to do a fifteen-foot slide on the casino carpets. We were like hockey players who had no place off the ice. All we wanted to do was skate. As I sit here thinking about it, I feel like Forrest Gump on that bench. Now, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you, but I could slide like the wind blows. From that day on, if I was going somewhere, I was sliding! Walking was out of the picture, we tried to be exclusively sliding whenever possible. Take three steps, slide fifteen. Take another three, slide another fifteen, fall. Get up, get kicked out, slide to the next casino.
We carried on like this not only in the Luxor and Excalibur, but through the Tropicana, New York–New York, and the Monte Carlo. By the time we got to Monte Carlo, we had our routine down pat. We’d get a running head start toward a bar in the casino, then plant our feet at the entrance to that bar and slide the rest of the way until our hips slammed into either an open spot at the bar or a very angry patron waiting for a drink. Those poor patrons. Imagine if you’re waiting at a bar and BOOM a giant guy in his fudgies slams into you and before you can even say anything BOOM there’s another, on the other side of you. BOOM! A third just fell directly at your feet and can’t get up because he’s belly laughing too hard. Do you fight these guys or run for your life? Oh, never mind, security is here to escort them out.
We were very good at getting our drink orders in and paid for before security flagged us each time. This was essential in staying as drunk as we needed to be, considering. The security guards were actually all really nice and had no problem letting us keep our drinks as we were escorted to town lines, just so long as we made our way on the other side of them and became someone else’s problem. If you consider the fact that Sean works in hospitality in Vegas, things were pretty bad. He’s worked in almost every casino in the Strip at one point or another, and he knows people everywhere. On any night before that and any night since, Sean is the darling of Las Vegas. He’s got all the credentials. He’s from the East Coast, so he at one point had some semblance of a work ethic, he’s quick with a joke, and he’s a cutie. If you don’t believe me, just check out his Facebook profile; he’s probably self-confirmed all three compliments via status updates within the last twenty minutes. The guy has a legitimate problem.
At the very least, we had a solid buzz going. We did approximately two shots at each casino before we were asked to leave. After the first casino, we learned pretty quickly. Order immediately upon dance-sliding into the closest bar in sight. Either order shots or “whiskey neats” when you are eventually denied shots. We’d crush a round real quick, and we’d sit on the next one. We’d act like normal patrons who happened to be wearing only fudgies. We’d act like we didn’t have disproportionate leg-to-torso ratios and that our legs had seen the sun at some point, ever. Like clockwork, we’d be asked to leave right after paying for the second round. The real beauty of Las Vegas is that there’s no open container law. And no one gives a shit about anything except cheating while you gamble. Since we never gamble, no one gives a shit about us. As long as we had the drinks in our hands, we could take them with us! They didn’t even give us to-go cups, they just shooed us out with glasses full of whiskey.
It was early enough that the streets were still full of Halloween people in costume, not just straight-up freaks. Vegas on Halloween is full of freaks, though, so we embraced it and let our freak flags fly a little bit. Dave, Sean, and I grabbed a coupla whalebone Long Island iced teas from a horrified street vendor and took to the strip exactly like three giant Risky Business Tom Cruises would have. Sliding, dancing, romancing, all three! People were eating it up, too. Next thing I knew, we were gallivanting around the Strip with a new group of best friends! I wanted to think our new friends were laughing with us, that they thought we were funny and clever and great dancers. Realistically, though, these people just couldn’t look away. It was like a car crash.
We decided to take another crack at drinking inside, as people do. Our next stop was the Bellagio. The Bellagio is the queen bee of Las Vegas casinos. For a crew of outlaws, as we were that night, the Bellagio was our Fort Knox. We wanted to approach the Bellagio much like Danny Ocean did in Ocean’s Eleven. The only problem was, how were we supposed to have unwavering confidence and cheeky gimmicks without our hip black guy speaking cockney English? I know, impossible. All we could do was walk into the Bellagio cautiously and poke around slowly. Okay, not that slowly
or cautiously. We were still sliding everywhere, just with a little poise, so as to not draw too much attention to ourselves. That was the story with me and Dave, anyway. Sean was so drunk, he was falling every time. He had been so steamed about us drinking all of his fancy-pants tequila that he went on an aggressive catch-up campaign and totally overshot his landing. We thought the jig was up until something amazing happened.
Suddenly, like a shooting star, something bright and beautiful and blond slid past us. Dave spotted her first—he always has an eye out for blondes. This beautiful blond streak happened to be a gal with the same costume as us! Risky Business! She was inside already and had the whole getup, down to the shades. She wasn’t wearing pants or shoes, either. She looked much better in her fudgies than we ever could have hoped for. More than looking great, she was our litmus test. Her mere existence in the Bellagio meant that the Bellagio was fudgie-friendly! No security guards were giving her grief whatsoever. Isn’t it fucked-up how much sexism oppresses men?
With the dream-weaver blonde in the Risky Business getup leading the way, my brothers and I did our patented dance-slide into the bar and immediately slammed into a large group of Asian people. That didn’t go over well. Three giant bouncers saw and were on us in a flash. It was such a flash, in fact, we concluded that they had been warned ahead of time. Las Vegas security apparently is some secret brotherhood, and everybody warns everybody else about troublemakers. We didn’t even get a drink at the Bellagio. WELL, what about the girl version??!! Sean screamed at the security guy. The bouncer just looked at us like our dad did that time when we tried to pretend the porn on mom’s laptop wasn’t our doing. Out we went.